


Out of the Void

by Starkiller007



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M, Slow Burn, Takes place after Infiniti War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-06
Packaged: 2019-07-07 07:44:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15903927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starkiller007/pseuds/Starkiller007
Summary: After Avengers: Infiniti War, Tony Stark deals with the ashes of the ones who disappeared. Peter's disappearance breaks his heart and he vows to get revenge on Thanos. But little did anyone know, Doctor Strange had a trick up his sleeve and now he and Peter are going to set things right.





	1. Chapter 1

Of all the people to disappear into dust, why did one of them have to be Peter? Tony held the frightened teenager in his arms. Peter had looked into his face, pleading for help, struggling for existence against a foe that he couldn’t fight. 

The way Peter had run into his arms, hugging him, as if Tony could help. As if Tony wasn’t as helpless as every other life form in the universe. 

As Tony laid Peter to the ground, his heart sinks. He can’t stand that scared look on Peter’s face, wishes he could stop whatever was happening. But he can’t. He failed. 

Iron Man failed. 

Half the universe wiped out in an instant. 

That scared look on Peter’s face. 

Tony clenches his fists, clenches at dust. His heart ached. He dragged Peter into this. An innocent child. 

Tony hadn’t been thinking clearly at the time when he’d decided to drag a fifteen year old child into a war, asking him to fight Captain America. What had he been thinking? 

He kneels in the dirt. Alone. Was this Thanos’s idea of payback? A fifty-fifty chance and everyone around Tony disappears. 

The only company he had now was his guilt. And the vivid memory of Peter Parker’s frightened face. 

After Berlin, Peter had been so excited about fighting with him. About being with the Avengers. He was such a refreshing contrast to all the others. None of the cynicism, none of the PTSD… He was just Peter. Excited Peter. 

Tony couldn’t stop replaying a certain memory in his head. Dropping him off after Berlin. All Tony had wanted was to get the excited boy back home so Tony could grab a drink. 

When Tony had reached over to open the door, Peter thought Tony was going to hug him. 

“We’re not there yet,” he’d quipped. Tony had been too preoccupied with the Accords to take Peter into consideration. He hadn’t hugged him, had only pushed him out of the car so Tony could get back to his own problems. 

Tony’s heart ached. When had he started caring so much about the Spiderman?

 

 

An inky void. Unrelenting darkness. 

A place more empty than the human mind can imagine. A new place… Or had it always been there? 

A space away from time. A space away from space. 

From the nothingness, a teenage voice rings out: 

“Mr. Stark?”

Silence and darkness. 

The voice calls out again: “Hello? Can anybody hear me?” 

Peter was starting to panic. He didn’t know where he was. Couldn’t sense anything. It was almost as if he didn’t exist. He was just an idea. This is what it felt like to be an idea? It was almost comforting in a way… If Peter wanted, he could simply fade from existence, become part of something bigger… almost a feeling of going home…

But then he remembered Tony Stark. Thanos. All that had happened. He couldn’t fade away now. 

He focuses his consciousness. He still existed. He had tried not to go… tried to force himself not to turn to dust, but in the end whatever spell Thanos had cast was too strong. 

He lost his body… But he still existed. He focuses on the only thing he can: his voice. He yells into the void. 

“Help! Somebody!” 

Peter keeps yelling into the darkness until he can feel his vocal chords. He suddenly has a throat and a pair of lungs, though he must be imagining them. 

He keeps yelling, because the noise makes him feel real again, reminds him that he still exists. Because if he’s quiet, that peacefulness overtakes him and he begins to fade away… forget who he is… 

But the image of Iron Man keeps bringing him back. 

So he keeps yelling. He doesn’t know how long. He just makes noise as if it’s all he can do to maintain his existence. 

Eventually… 

An annoyed voice responds back, “Could you stop that?” 

Peter’s heart jumped. Wait did he have a heart now? He feels intense relief and laughs, almost crying. 

“Hey! Doctor Strange! It’s me, Peter!” He’s so happy to hear another voice. “Hey, where are you?”

“Could you please stop talking?” 

“But… I think talking is all I can do in this place… Are you okay? Am I okay? Do you know where we are? Is this some special time dimension?” Peter babbles on, eager to hear back from Doctor Strange. 

He can hear a loud sigh. Was Doctor Strange annoyed at him? 

A green light. Peter remembers he has eyes. 

Suddenly, Doctor Strange and Peter are in Peter’s bedroom. 

It feels so sudden that Peter is shocked for a moment. “Wow!” He touches himself, runs hands over his chest. He’s in his Spiderman uniform and he’s real again! 

Peter yips in delight. “We’re home!” He gets up and runs to the door. “Aunt May!” 

When he opens it, there is nothing but an empty void. He stares into the unrelenting darkness, his mouth going dry. “We’re not home.” He closes the door, as if that somehow made a difference, and turns around to face Doctor Strange. 

Peter looks at Strange for an answer. But Strange only stares back at him, looking every inch an intimidating wizard and looking so out of place in Peter’s room. 

“This isn’t really my room.” Peter leans against the door. He rests his head back, because the hardness of the door reminded him that he was real, even if this place wasn’t. 

“Perceptive. You wouldn’t stop talking, so I thought this might shut you up.” 

“But…”

“Yes?” Doctor Strange sounds so nonchalant that Peter doesn’t know how to respond to it. 

“How did we get here?” Peter asks. His voice trembles. He sounds vulnerable. Scared. 

Doctor Strange is silent for a long while. Time didn’t seem to pass normally in this place. Peter couldn’t tell if a second had passed or an hour. 

Finally, Strange answers him: “I know how I got here. I don’t know how you got here.” 

Strange turns and sits on his bed, adopting a meditative pose and levitating into the air. 

Peter takes a step towards him. “Are you gonna explain any of this to me?”

“Your will to live is strong. Perhaps stronger than the rest… Or…” Strange pauses and opens his eyes. He brushes some invisible dust off his shoulders. Peter was sure there was nothing there. Strange holds up a piece of white string. “Your DNA is in this. It gets everywhere, you know.” He tosses it aside. 

Peter blushes. “Do you have a plan to get us out of here?”

Strange sighs deeply. “If you will be quiet for once, I’m meditating on an answer. I tried ignoring you, but you wouldn’t shut up. So I conjured this room for you. Now if you please.” Strange turns back to his meditation, closing his eyes. 

Peter takes an eager step towards the doctor. “But what am I supposed to do?”

“Sit down and be quiet.” 

Peter snaps, “I won’t sit around! I’m tired of everybody pushing me around because I’m a kid! Let me help!” He moves to stand directly in front of Doctor Strange, almost getting in his face. “I can help,” he says firmly, eyes determined. 

Strange just looks at him for a long moment. Finally, “Perhaps you can.” He holds his hand out. “Take my hand.” 

Peter eyes it wearily, but takes the offered hand. What he sees next scares him so much, he clings onto Doctor Strange for dear life.


	2. Chapter 2

Doctor Strange’s parting words rang in Tony’s head. “It was the only way,” the wizard had said. 

One chance out of like fourteen million to succeed. Did numbers even work that way? Had there been such a slim chance of winning? 

Tony would like to spend more time lamenting his life and the decisions he’s made, but he has to find a way off Titan. 

Nebula was the only person left on the planet with him. They spend some time searching and eventually find a rough looking ship. 

“What is this piece of junk?” Tony asks, stepping inside to look around. 

Nebula sighs. “It’s the Benatar.” She steps inside after Tony and takes a good look. “My sister’s ship.”

Tony whistles. “The Benatar, huh?” He pokes around the cock pit and finds a zune. It’s somewhat startling to see the human device in the alien ship, but Tony presses play and a song called Rubberband Man starts playing. “Not bad.”

He turns to Nebula. “You ready to get out of here?”

Nebula just stares. “Thanos might still be here. He’ll return. After Earth.”

“So he’s your dad, right?” Tony asks brusquely, trying to ascertain whether he should trust the blue chick or not. 

“I hate him. I want to kill him. I’ve tried. So many times. And failed.” 

Tony tinkers around the cock pit. “Well, we both screwed the pooch on this one.”

“Excuse me?”

“We fucked up. We failed.” Tony continues blustering around, sitting in the pilots seat, figuring out the controls. Do they have enough gas? Food for the journey?

When he turns to start peppering Nebula with questions, he sees that she’s curled up in a corner, staring off into space. 

Tony doesn’t particularly want an emotional conversation. The last thing he wants is to comfort a child of Thanos whether she hates him or not. But he’s alone and she’s the only one here. 

He moves over to her and stands awkwardly. “Hey, we’re gonna get out of here and we’re going to avenge the universe.”

She looks up at him, despair written across her face. “He always gets what he wants. He always has.” 

Tony’s jaw sets firmly, stubbornly. “Then we have to change that. He took away my friends. I don’t care how long it takes or how impossible it may see, but I’m getting them back.”

Nebula nods and stands. “Is this junk gonna fly?”

“It will by the time I’m done with it.” 

Tony gets to work quickly, building himself a way out of here. The Bantar is a piece of junk, but it’s something to work with. And there are plenty of materials on Titan and Tony’s always been good at improvising. 

He’s ran out of nanobots. His side is killing him. He has to make something better than he’s made before. 

After several long discussions with Nebula about what to collect, Tony is tired enough that he can barely keep his eyes open. The Benatar has a few bunks, which Tony is grateful for. Nebula disappears and Tony doesn’t know whether he should be worried or not. 

He goes to sleep and dreams. 

He’s disembodied and moving towards a giant rock. He feels himself being guided by his heart, being pulled along as if on a string. Something about the string is so utterly familiar… so silky but strong, like a spiderweb… 

Peter. 

Tony’s heart warms. Peter wasn’t gone after all. He was here somewhere. 

The rock moves closer and Tony can see the giant purple Titan sitting on a stone throne. 

What he sees next shocks him and frightens him to his core. 

“Peter!” he shouts, moving towards the rock even though he knows this is a bad idea. He’s gotten his ass kicked before and he’s not up for another fight. Not yet anyway. 

Peter Parker was sitting on Thanos’s lap. He sits demurely in his spider suit, the one Tony made for him. Peter looks so youthful and innocent, a softness to him that Tony never appreciated before. A certain vulnerability that makes Tony that much more protective of Peter. 

And this monster had him in his clutches. Peter sat on one of Thanos’s massive thighs and as Tony gets closer, he sees there’s a steel collar around Peter’s neck. 

Thanos pets Peter’s hair with his massive purple hand and Peter’s never seemed so small and fragile. Tony has to rescue him. 

Tony approaches the throne, snarling. Thanos stole Peter from him. That’s the only explanation he can think of in this dream state. 

“That boy. He’s part of my team. He’s mine. Let him go.” Tony’s voice is firm. He stands strong, even as his side still aches in pain from being stabbed. He can’t let Peter down. Not again. 

“Mr. Stark!” Peter’s voice cracks and he reaches out, looks ready to jump right out of the titan’s lap. But he’s trapped by the collar, it nearly choking him as he reaches towards Tony. 

Thanos just laughs. “He’s mine now.” He runs a massive purpls finger down Peter’s back. Peter shivers. “He’s my little pet spider. Adorable, isn’t he?”

“I’m taking him back. I’m taking him home.” 

“This is his home now. In my lap. Isn’t it, pet?”

Peter’s quiet as he sits on Thanos’s lap, looking so small and innocent. Tony feels guilty all over again for dragging him into this war. 

“I need him! Peter, I need you! Come with me!” Tony shouts and tries to run towards the throne, wants to grab Peter and drag him back, but he’s being pulled back, back into the darkness, through the vast galaxy, back to Titan. 

But Peter is important. Far more important than Tony or anyone else had realized. 

He wakes up in a pool of sweat, panting hard. His heart is heavy with sadness and grief. He wants to think the dream doesn’t mean anything. Wants to think it’s some nightmare cocktail. He would rather Peter have disappeared than be sitting on the lap of Thanos of all people. 

He wants to get that image out of his head. He pushes himself out of the bunk. 

He can’t think about what he’s just seen. Has to chalk it up to just a bad dream. But he has a sinking feeling it’s more than that and it’s something bad. Tony has to get back to work.


End file.
